D&D 4E Guide to the 4e Warlock (2026-02-01)

[Tigris]

If you just mean Dark warlock then you're probably looking at a fast cursebite/cursegrind build. The only thing dark pact is really giving you here is the +INT to damage. Unfortunately you don't have any easy access to a good pact boon this way.


The problem is the trigger. By the time you get Darkspiral Aura to any decent value in one encounter, nearly all the enemies will be dead already - they have to die to give you pact boons, unless you're using Bloodied Boon specifically for Darkspiral Aura. That means that as the value of it climbs, it becomes less and less likely that any enemy will melee or ranged attack you to trigger it in the first place, and the damage of it becomes less and less relevant because you could have cleaned up that enemy before it got another turn regardless.

The scaling doesn't help, of course. Gaining 1 damage per tick every 10 levels is horrendous scaling, to the point where even a 4 or 5 charge pact boon will do very little to enemies at paragon, never mind epic levels. And then there's the fact that it's only melee or ranged - can't use it against area or close attacks because WotC hates you.

The sole thing it has going for it is that at least it's an immediate interrupt at least. At least WotC didn't make it IR.

Thank you for the answer, it has a lot of good things in there, but there are some things which I do not understand / where you may have misunderstood me


1. When I say "there are people who want to play Dark Pact", then I would assume they play it because they like the game mechanic, so they want to use their unique pact boon and not make a build to use as phew things as possible from dark pact. There are always people who like a certain mechanic, and honestly I also like the mechanic of the dark pact with the aura.

Thats what I mean with a guide on how to make best use of the pact (with this I mean the pacts actual abilities!) Is a lot better than just saying the pact is bad, because that does not help if you want to use the mechanics.


2. Why do you refuse so much to use the Dark Pact boon? Again people who want to play dark pact are people who like the pact and with it the boon so for them its not "oh no unfortunately you have to use the pact boon you like and chose." I get it its not DPR optimal pact boon compared to elemental, but the pact boons except elemental also dont give damage, just survivability /utility and Dark Pact does give survivability AND some damage.


3. Why do you think the Dark Pact boon does scale bad? It has actually non linear scaling.

• As you say it deals good damage in heroic, thats a good start!
  • Its inherent scaling is only 1 damage (average) per tier.
• So this by itself does not scale well, but the damage does not only scale inherently, but it does also scale with "Life-Draining Gauntlets, dual mind strength, extra damage from sources like Yorgrix's Brutality, vulnerability from e.g. Rod of Ulban, general bonuses from sources like Magic Weapon" and also the Darkwalker level 11 feature while insubstantial
  • Since its psychic damage it also works with weakness (like elemental pact boon)
  • As you say its easy in higher levels to deal 12 damage with it!
• Good so when its easy to deal 12 damage with it, now we have a 2nd form of scaling unlocked: Weaken an enemy attack! If you deal 12 damage the enemies attack is weakened dealing only half damage to you.
  • Enemy damage scales as 1 per level. So the weaken effect scales at 0.5 damage prevention per level. Thats 15 for 30 levels. If you use it against a brute or an encounter attack (or the combination) it may even be 25-50% more so up to 22.5 Or against an elite or solo even more! (Also monster level does not even end at 30)
  • So even in the simple case, the damage reduction scales from 4-19, which starts stronger and ends weaker than the dark ones blessing which scales 1-30 so at the end still 57% of the damage mitigation from that one! (On top of the damage it does)
• Now this damage also scales with how often the pact boon is triggered, while this is only partially true for Elemental Pact Accursed Affinity, since an enemy can only be affected once by it. Similar Dark Ones Blessing, you can only have once Temporary hit points. Every trigger adds (potential) damage. And how often you can trigger it does also scale:
  • Bloodied Boon, Twofold Curse, Relentless Curse (and most likely more).
  • In addition number of minions in higher levels is higher according to DMG2 for 1 normal enemy the number of minions is 4/5/6
• Then the next form of scaling, number of uses. You always speak about "building up a big darkspiral aura", but why should you do that? If you get +11 to damage on the spiral, this means you can use it every single round, because when you hit with 12+ damage you get the aura back to 1 so you can use it again next round for sure. Warlocks do have inheritent no immediate reaction. So you can potentially use this every round.
  • Also the way the game is made, the combat will go slightly longer (in rounds) in higher tiers in average, so more turns to use it.
  • Then a small thing, but thanks to Bloodied Boons, minions and Twofold Curse, you potentially later gain access to darkspiral aura much earlier. (Like ideally in the first turn you already get 1 aura stack). This means you more likely can use it against an encounter power, so preventing more damage!
• There are also some things you can get which scale with darkfire aura, even if they are mostly not that good:
  • 2 Feats improved darkspiral aura and demonweb spiral(slight damage upgrade, and an immobilize (which was a lot better before the power got nerfed from free action to immediate action, since you could use it in your turn when opportunity actions were made vs you)), 1 item (darkspire rod) and 1 utility power from paragon path (your darkspiral aura once also gives you insubstantial until the end of your next turn).
• It actually harmonizes really well with other pact boons if you do take Twofold pact (later)!
  • You only need 1 (early) trigger to get 1 stack later, since you get that one back whenever you use it (if you have 11+ damage bonus)
  • You can make full use of all unneeded pact triggers, because it does stack with this pact unlike others. Like if you have relentless curse (and twofold curse) and there are minions in the fight, which get killed by allies in different turns.
  • It has direct synergy with other pacts
    • synergy with Dark One pact boon (temporary hitpoints which then are "doubled" thanks to weakness), also targeting will not reflex with at will (so you can choose)
    • synergy with elemental pact, since its psychic damage so you can trigger the weakness also targetting will not reflex with at will (so you can choose)
    • Vestige Zuttwa Pactboon can easier be used when you are less squishy and can go into melee
    • Misty Step Pactboon: Teleport in position such that enemies need to attack you or walk away from you.

Then of course there is still the problem of "how do you get attacked", well you can play offtank. If you stand next to an enemy as only target, they will have to attack you or move away from you and most likely get an opportunity attack. Even if they shift away from you and charge someone else, if you are good positioned you can still do an opportunity attack, and you have potentially Eldritch strike to do good opportunity attacks. And there are other feats items etc. which makes you want to be attacked

• Pact Blade deals damage when you are attacked
• Warlocks Wrath feat from Tieflings
• Ways to get insubstantial (level 6 utility power, and encounter attack and utility power from the Paragon path). So its a lot better if enemies attack you, since you only take half damage (and maybe a defender can punish them even! Swordmage or pala from range).
• You are int based (secondary score) + learther + have Shadow walk class feature so your armor is actually quite good.

Of course you are a striker, but in the end the goal of combat is not to kill enemies as fast as possible but to use as phew ressources as possible including healing surges, so being able to quite effectively offtank some damage (which helps that the defender does not burn through all their healing surges which can be a problem) is a good bonus. And if you have +3 feat bonus +6 enhancement bonus +8 damage from int, +6 damage from brutality feat, +15 damage from elemental pact weakness (and +6 damage from pact blade) and get attacked every round, thats also another 49.5 DPR

 

[Exocist]

2. Why do you refuse so much to use the Dark Pact boon? Again people who want to play dark pact are people who like the pact and with it the boon so for them its not "oh no unfortunately you have to use the pact boon you like and chose." I get it its not DPR optimal pact boon compared to elemental, but the pact boons except elemental also dont give damage, just survivability /utility and Dark Pact does give survivability AND some damage.

It's not a refusal to use it as much as the incapability of using it in the first place by the time it has sufficient stacks on it to do any meaningful damage. Yes you might be able to throw out 1 or 2 charge darkspiral auras, but those aren't going to be impactful.

As you say it deals good damage in heroic, thats a good start!

It does good damage in low heroic, and even then only with a few charges. Yes when the enemy has 32 health (average at level 1), 2d6 or 3d6 will look good. When the enemy has 80 health (average at level 7), 2d6 or 3d6 is really not that much. When the enemy has 144 health (average at level 15), 2d8 or 3d8 is barely anything.

Since its psychic damage it also works with weakness (like elemental pact boon)

Darkspiral Aura cannot be used with Elemental Pact boon. Elemental pact can only convert damage that you deal on your turn, and necrotic/psychic are not among the list of elemental types it can apply weakness to.

Weaken an enemy attack! If you deal 12 damage the enemies attack is weakened dealing only half damage to you.

Which is still only useful if you can actually use it. With the number of area/close attacks going up as you level, that becomes less likely. Most of the high damage attacks on enemies - encounter and recharge powers - will be area or close, further reducing the efficacy of the weaken on it.

In addition number of minions in higher levels is higher according to DMG2 for 1 normal enemy the number of minions is 4/5/6

DMG says this but practically most people who run 4e these days will budget minions as nothing, or just not include them at all. 4e has too many ways to instantly kill minions in a large area to justify their XP budget. Never mind cases where the inclusion of minions is advantageous to players.

2 Feats improved darkspiral aura and demonweb spiral(slight damage upgrade, and an immobilize (which was a lot better before the power got nerfed from free action to immediate action, since you could use it in your turn when opportunity actions were made vs you)), 1 item (darkspire rod) and 1 utility power from paragon path (your darkspiral aura once also gives you insubstantial until the end of your next turn).

The power was never nerfed from immediate action to free action, they just removed the unnecessary text

The original printing in FRPG says this "Once per round as a free action when an enemy makes a melee attack or a ranged attack against you, you can use your Darkspiral Aura as an immediate interrupt, dealing 1d6 necrotic and psychic damage to that enemy for each point of your Darkspiral Aura’s current value. "

Of course, that first bit "once per round, as a free action" is almost completely redundant if it's already an immediate interrupt so they just removed it.

Giving an enemy the choice to make an OA which you then punish them for is worse than not giving them that choice at all, which is something that warlock can do fairly easily. Most classes can by heroic.

Then of course there is still the problem of "how do you get attacked", well you can play offtank. If you stand next to an enemy as only target, they will have to attack you or move away from you and most likely get an opportunity attack.

This is not practically how 4e ends up working. Simply sitting next to an enemy won't force an OA. Shift+Charge is mentioned because it's a universal option that all monsters have access to right from level 1, which normal characters can already struggle to punish unless their party is lined up perfectly behind them such that there is no way for the monster to charge without provoking, which is a rarity. Usually, even if the monster is directly N of you, they can shift NE or NW, then charge, making the first space SE (from NE) or SW (from NW) and avoid your OA entirely. Or they could shift away with a power. Or they could teleport away. Or you could get dazed or blinded by something else which prevents you making that OA. Or they could go invisible. Or you could get pushed. Or they could shift and use a ranged or area attack. Or they could use a close attack. Or, or, or...

There are so many options that monsters get access to which stuff your OAs by Paragon that simply standing next to them is not sufficient.

You can have all the features you want that make you want to be attacked. It's still up to the enemies to actually attack you, which they can avoid doing. Warlocks can trivially have very high defenses that will make enemies not attack them in the first place, and lowering your defenses just makes you worse without making the "enemies avoiding you" situation better.

Of course you are a striker, but in the end the goal of combat is not to kill enemies as fast as possible but to use as phew ressources as possible including healing surges, so being able to quite effectively offtank some damage (which helps that the defender does not burn through all their healing surges which can be a problem) is a good bonus. And if you have +3 feat bonus +6 enhancement bonus +8 damage from int, +6 damage from brutality feat, +15 damage from elemental pact weakness (and +6 damage from pact blade) and get attacked every round, thats also another 49.5 DPR

It's not an implement power so you can rule out the +6 enhancement bonus. It can't get that.

You can sure add the +8 damage from int if you are insubstantial and have darkwalker, which makes the enemy want to avoid attacking you even more. Yogrix's Brutality needs to be turned on, which warlocks can't do easily. Maybe if you powerswap to wizard and take Fire Shroud or something like that, but it's a feat with a conditional that isn't easy. Rod of Ulban is a 25th level item that you shouldn't be planning around to make it work, realistically you're stuck with Rod of Mindbending which is 2-3. Elemental pact boon doesn't work. Unless you have a friendly artificer or warlord giving you a +4-6 general damage bonus, 1d8+6ish is where your paragon damage is at with one charge, which is terrible.